One Last Look At The Real Economy Before It Implodes - Part 6 - Solutions

By Brandon Smith

All problems, all crises, have at least one solution, if not many solutions. There is no such thing as an unwinnable scenario. Some may not be smart enough or courageous enough to see it, but the solution is always there, waiting to be discovered. The only fight that cannot be won is the fight in which the enemy makes all the rules and we foolishly abide by those rules. Life is not a game of chess, and a man can choose to be more than a pawn anytime he has the guts to do so.

In the past, I have likened the liberty movement to a rebellion against not just tyrants but the game itself - a group of people willing to walk away from the chess board and make their own rules. I stand by that assertion. However, simply walking away is not enough; we must also be willing to take actions that will destroy the game entirely.

In order to accomplish this task, any rebellion against corruption of power must be self-critical - more self-critical of its own weaknesses than opposing propagandists could ever be. Most of our problems as a society are being caused by a relatively small number of elitists, but we will never be able to undo these problems without understanding our weaknesses as much as the enemy’s weaknesses. In this final installment of my six-part series, I will talk about REAL solutions to the inevitable economic implosion in front of us, but I will also discuss the shortcomings of the liberty movement as an obstacle to the success of those solutions.

One Last Look At The Real Economy Before It Implodes - Part 5

Brandon Smith

Since I began writing analysis for the liberty movement more than eight years ago, I have always said that we will know when the endgame of the globalists is upon us when the criminals come out into the light of day and admit to their crimes. At that moment, it will be because they no longer fear either the repercussions or their plans being obstructed.

As I plan to show in this installment of my series on the hidden fiscal collapse of America, the endgame has indeed arrived. At the very least, the international elites seem to think success is within their grasp, for they now openly expose their own criminality. But they do so in a way that attempts to divert blame or to rationalize their actions as being for the “greater good.”

One Last Look At The Real Economy Before It Implodes - Part 4

Brandon Smith

In the first three installments of this series, we examined the realities behind supply and demand, unemployment and personal debt, and national debt. As has been proven in each consecutive article with ample evidence, mainstream establishment numbers are, for the most part, utter garbage. They are not legitimate. They are meaningless.

The figures and stats that do have some truth to them are so obscured from the public view and unreported by the media that they may as well be state secrets. The average person has no clue of their existence because his primary sources of information are establishment-dominated. Even MSM talking heads and economic “analysts” are so mesmerized by the false version of the economic world that they have no point of reference when suddenly confronted with singular facts. Some people call this catastrophic behavior a “positive feedback loop.” It is a mainstream echo chamber that has become a financial tomb.

Now that I have covered the lies within our economy that I can prove absolutely, it is time to move on to the lies that are more difficult to pin down. These lies often slip past our investigations because the hard data that could be used to expose them is simply not available to the general public. In fact, much of the data is not even available to government officials. I am, of course, talking about the hard data behind the activities of central banks across the globe — the International Monetary Fund, the Bank for International Settlements and the Federal Reserve in particular. In this installment, we will explore the purpose of these lies; to hide the imminent destruction of our currency — by hook, by crook and by fiat.

One Last Look At The Real Economy Before It Implodes - Part 1

Brandon Smith

We are only two months into 2015, and it has already proven to be the most volatile year for the economic environment since 2008-2009. We have seen oil markets collapsing by about 50 percent in the span of a few months (just as the Federal Reserve announced the end of QE3, indicating fiat money was used to hide falling demand), the Baltic Dry Index losing 30 percent since the beginning of the year, the Swiss currency surprise, the Greeks threatening EU exit (and now Greek citizens threatening violent protests with the new four-month can-kicking deal), and the effects of the nine-month-long West Coast port strike not yet quantified. This is not just a fleeting expression of a negative first quarter; it is a sign of things to come.

My Liberty Movement Suicide Security Pledge

Brandon Smith

I woke up this morning to the very disturbing and saddening news that a Liberty Movement colleague, David Crowley, had been found dead in his Minnesota home along with his wife and 5-year-old daughter. Mainstream media outlets, without any apparent evidence or backing from local police and coroner reports, have immediately injected the notion of “murder-suicide”, suggesting that Crowley was somehow unstable, and that he had murdered his own family and then took his own life. MSM articles showcase Crowley in tactical attire and holding firearms (most of which were props for his upcoming film Gray State, which depicts the collapse of America and the rise of a totalitarian society very close to what we are actually facing today). Ostensibly these photos, along with the fact that Crowley owned “many guns”, are being used to convince the public that the murder-suicide theory is plausible. The police, on the other hand, are treating the deaths as “suspicious”.

I met David Crowley myself in Tampa, Florida during the Paulfest rally and RNC in 2012. We had bunked in the same house with multiple other liberty activists and movement voices. We hung out around the pool, drank beer, discussed the growing troubles of the day, and joked about the absurdity of it all to make ourselves feel better. From what I remember of Crowley, he was a level headed and dedicated military veteran, with absolutely NO signs of mental instability, anger, or depression. I happen to be very familiar with the signals of post traumatic stress disorder, and Crowley had none of them. He knew his path in life, his film concept was gaining momentum and funding, and his mission was clear. None of the psychologically debilitating elements of bewilderment, lack of focus, and lack of self-value common to suicide victims were present in Crowley's attitude or life.

What Will You Do When Government Tyranny And Terrorism Work Hand In Hand?

Brandon Smith

I was in the middle of working on an article covering real U.S. economic stats versus manipulated statistics when the Charlie Hebdo shootings took place. And though I knew the implications of the event would be far-reaching, I was originally undeterred from my financial subject matter. I had already covered in previous articles the inevitability of ISIS attacks on Europe and America, including the “warnings” of Saudi Arabia in August of last year that jihadists would target the EU within months and the U.S. a month later. 

In September of last year, ISIS publicly urged attacks on French and U.S. citizens. 

I have also published extensive analysis on the covert funding and training of ISIS militants by Saudi Arabia and Western intelligence agencies, including my article “The Time Is Ripe For A False Flag Attack On American Soil.” 

The bottom line is the Paris attack was not surprising in the slightest. I have no doubt whatsoever that such attacks are going to increase in frequency, that the U.S. will be hit soon, and that our government will do little to nothing to stop such tragedies. However, a Reuters article titled “White House to hold global security summit Feb (sic) 18: U.S. official” caught my eye. And after reading it, I’m afraid I have to set aside my financial piece until next week and break down the insanity that is now taking place in the world of geopolitics. 

We Are Entering An Era Of Shattered Illusions

Brandon Smith

The structure of history is held together by two essential and distinct kinds of links, two moments in time to which no one is immune: moments of epiphany, and moments of catastrophe. Sometimes, both elements intermingle at the birth of a singular epoch. Men often awaken to understanding in the midst of great crisis; and, invariably, great crises can erupt when men awaken. These are the moments when social gravity vanishes, when the kinetic glue of normalcy melts away, and we begin to see the true foundations of our world, if a foundation exists at all.

Catastrophe occurs when too many people refuse to accept that around us always are two universes at work. There is the cold, hard reality that underlies everything. And on the surface is a veil of deceit and compromise. The more humanity compromises vital truths in order to enjoy the comfort of illusions, the more mind-shattering it will be when those illusions fall away. These two worlds can coexist only for short periods of time, and they will always and eventually collide. There is no other possible outcome.

I think it could be said that the more polarized our realities become, the more explosive and disastrous the reaction will be when the separation is removed. I feel it absolutely necessary to relate this danger because today humanity is living so historically far from the bedrock of reality, political reality, social reality and economic reality that the stage has been set for a kind of full-spectrum destabilization that has never been seen before. 

Why Is Independence So Frightening To Some People?

Brandon Smith

In past articles I have examined the nature of power and division in our society and have always come to the same conclusion, that there are only two types of people: the people who want control over others and the people who just want to be left alone. However, there are also subgroups that swim within the boundaries of each end of the spectrum. Often, psychologists and self-help gurus attempt to promote the idea that the defining quality of the average person’s life is whether he is a follower or a leader. I have seen this spectrum applied to every political and social organization.

Ironically, I have heard so-called “leftists” argue that the nature of their ideology makes them more adept at leadership and that conservatives are more prone to become followers (ostensibly because conservatives tend to be more religious). I have heard the same argument from people on the so-called “right,” only in reverse. The problem is that very few people in our society understand anymore what it actually means to be a leader. Most Americans today are followers, whether they know it or not.  And sadly, followers tend to also seek out control over other people, if only to make up for the lack of control they feel in their own lives.  That is to say, most followers tend to pursue petty opportunities for leadership.

The Time Is Ripe For A False-Flag Attack On American Soil

Brandon Smith

Government engineered false-flag terrorism is a historically established fact. For centuries, political and financial elites have been sinking ships, setting buildings on fire, assassinating diplomats, overthrowing elected leaders, and blowing people up, then blaming these disasters on convenient scapegoats so that they can induce fear in the public and transfer more power to themselves.

Skeptics might argue whether certain calamities have been proven beyond a reasonable doubt to be false-flag events, but no one can argue that such tactics have not been used by the establishment in the past. Governments have openly admitted to creating bloody and catalyzing tragedies under false pretenses, like Operation Gladio, a false-flag program in Europe supported by European and American covert agencies which lasted decades, from the 1950s to the 1990s.

When ‘Anti-Government’ Violence Erupts, Who Is Really At Fault?

Brandon Smith

This past week, I have been examining a recently leaked document from the Department Of Homeland Security entitled “Domestic Violent Extremists Pose A Threat To Government Officials And Law Enforcement.” (Yes; the title leaves nothing to the imagination.)

Generally, such documents are not classified. But it is internally accepted within establishment agencies that they should not be shared with the public. Similar documents like the Missouri Information Analysis Center report titled “The Modern Militia Movement” and the Virginia Fusion Center’s Terrorism Threat Assessment are not designed to import in-depth knowledge to law enforcement. In fact, if you actually investigate these white papers thoroughly, you will find they read like a mentally challenged middle-school student’s last-minute book report on liberty groups in America.

Rather than convey the complexity of the conflict between federal bureaucracy and constitutionalists, the papers linked above are meant to indoctrinate law enforcement officials against even considering what we have to say or why we take the actions we take.

Order Out Of Chaos: The Doctrine That Runs The World

Brandon Smith

From the days of Spartacus-Weishaupt to those of Karl Marx, and down to Trotsky (Russia), Bela Kun (Hungary), Rosa Luxembourg (Germany), and Emma Goldman (United States), this world-wide conspiracy for the overthrow of civilization and for the reconstitution of society on the basis of arrested development, of envious malevolence, and impossible equality, has been steadily growing. It played, as a modern writer, Mrs. Webster, has so ably shown, a definitely recognizable part in the tragedy of the French Revolution. It has been the mainspring of every subversive movement during the Nineteenth Century; and now at last this band of extraordinary personalities from the underworld of the great cities of Europe and America have gripped the Russian people by the hair of their heads and have become practically the undisputed masters of that enormous empire. - Winston Churchill, February 1920, in an article that appeared in the Illustrated Sunday Herald
  
The concept of conspiracy frightens some people, so much so that they are willing to overlook any and all evidence that world events are for the most part directed, rather than chaotic and coincidental. For those who are uneducated and unaware, explanations for the terrible tides of politics and war generally revolve around a false understanding of Occam’s razor. They argue that the theory states that the “simplest explanation” is usually the correct one for any particular problem or crisis. But Occam’s razor actually states that the simplest explanation according to the evidence at hand is usually the correct answer for any given problem. That is to say, the simplest explanation must conform to the evidence, or it is likely not correct.

Unfortunately, “skeptics” of directed conspiracy often turn a blind eye to evidence that is contrary to their simple explanations, while arguing that simplification is its own vindication. In other words, they don’t feel the need to defend their simplistic worldview because, in their minds, simplicity stands on its own as self-evident. There was a time when men believed that the planets revolved around each other because they were tied together by long glass strings, and this was evident to them because it was the simplest explanation they could come up with. The thinking of skeptics of the New World Order and concerted globalization is much like this.

Internationalists Are Pushing The World Towards Globally Engineered Economic Warfare

Brandon Smith

Over a year ago I published an essay entitled 'The Linchpin Lie: How Global Collapse Will Be Sold To The Masses'. This essay addressed efforts by the ever malicious Rand Corporation to create a false narrative surrounding the possibility of global collapse. Linchpin Theory, as it was named by it's originator and Rand Corp. employee, John Casti, is I believe the very future of propaganda. 

Every engineered crisis needs a clever cover story, and in Linchpin Theory, we are told that all human catastrophe is a mere natural product of the “overcomplexity” within various systems. Yes, there is no accounting of false flag geopolitics or elitist conspiracy, no acknowledgment of deliberately initiated chaos; such things do not exist in the world of “linchpins”. Rather, the Rand Corporation would have us believe that the world is a massive game of Jenga, and the supporting pieces just remove themselves from the teetering structure by magical and coincidental causality.

Today, the linchpin lie is now being carefully inserted into the mainstream narrative. I can't say I was shocked to hear Alan Greenspan use its basic premise when he recently stated that:

Expect Devastating Global Economic Changes In 2014

Brandon Smith

By any reasonable measure, I think it is safe to say that the last quarter of 2013 has been an insane game of economic Russian Roulette. Even more unsettling is the fact that most of the American population still has little to no clue that the U.S. was on the verge of a catastrophic catalyst event at least three times in the past three months alone, and that we face an even greater acceleration next year. 

The first near miss was the Federal Reserve's announcement of a possible “taper” of QE stimulus in early fall, which sent shivers through stock markets and proved what we have been saying all along – that the entire recovery is a facade built on an ever thinning balloon of fiat money. Today, markets function entirely on the expectation that the Fed will continue stimulus forever. If the Fed does cut QE in any way, the frail psychology of the markets will shatter, and the country will come crashing down with it.

The second near miss was the possible unilateral invasion of Syria demanded by the Obama Administration.

As we have discussed at Alt-Market for years, any invasion of Syria or Iran will bring detrimental consequences to the U.S. economy and energy markets, not to mention draw heavy opposition from Russia and China. Though the naïve shrug it off as a minor foreign policy bungle, Syria could have easily become WWIII, and I believe the only reason the establishment has not yet followed through with a strike in the region is because the alternative media has been so effective in warning the masses. The elites need a certain percentage of support from the general public and the military for any war action to be effective, which they did not receive. After all, no one wants to fight and die in support of CIA-funded Al Qaeda terrorist cells on the other side of the world. The establishment tried to hide who the rebels were, and failed. 

Are The Real Enemies In Syria Or Washington?

Brandon Smith

Engage people with what they expect; it is what they are able to discern and confirms their projections. It settles them into predictable patterns of response, occupying their minds while you wait for the extraordinary moment — that which they cannot anticipate. –Sun Tzu, The Art of War

The definition of what makes an “enemy” may vary from person to person. But I would say that, generally, an enemy is one who has an active ability to do irreparable harm to you or your essential values. He is motivated by destruction, the destruction of all that you hold dear. He is capable and unrelenting. He is a legitimate threat. He will not compromise. He will not waver. He will do anything to wound you. He will not stop. He is possessed.

Americans have spent the better part of a century being told who their enemies are with very little explanation or substantiation. We have blindly rallied around our patriotic prerogative without knowing the root cause of the conflict or the nature of the target we are told to annihilate. We have been suckered into war after war, conjured by international interests in order to lure us into accepting greater centralization and concentrated globalism. As a culture, I’m sorry to say, we have been used. We are a tool of unmitigated doom. We are the loaded gun in the hand of the devil.

Gold Markets Get Strange – Is Economic Danger Near?

image source

Brandon Smith

Traditionally, metals markets are supposed to be a solid fundamental signal of the physical and psychological health of our overall economy. Steady but uneventful commodities trade meant a generally healthy industrial base and consumption base. An extreme devaluation was a signal of deflation in consumer demand and a flight to currencies. Extreme price hikes meant a flight from normal assets and currencies in the wake of possible hyperinflation.

This is how gold and silver markets were originally designed to function – however, I welcome you to the wacky world of 2013, where bad financial news is met with the cheers of investors who believe stimulus will last forever, where foreign investors dump the U.S. dollar in bilateral trade while mainstream dupes argue that the Greenback is invincible, and where everyone and their uncle seems to be buying precious metals yet the official market value continues to plunge.

Is this weird? As Bill Murray would say: “Human sacrifice! Dogs and cats living together! Mass hysteria...!”

The reason our entire fiscal system now operates in a backwards manner is due to one simple truth - every major indicator of our economy today is manipulated by our central bank, which uses its printing press to prop up everything from equities to treasuries to municipal bonds. They openly admit to it. They are proud of the fact. They swagger about as if they are the heroes of the day. They act as if we should be thankful. But what is reality here?

Is Egypt On The Verge Of Engineered Civil War?

Brandon Smith

For thousands of years, Egypt has been one of the primary pillars of the Eastern world. When Egypt falls into turmoil, a shockwave is felt by all other nations that heralds great change and perhaps even great catastrophe. The West's longtime interest in maintaining a solid foothold in Egypt is based on this reality; even in our modern age, when Egypt is in your corner riches can be accumulated, and power can be gathered.

Our government along with European governments have gone to incredible lengths in the region in order to ensure Egyptian compliance. In the 1940s and 1950s, Britain sought to dominate the country through force of arms. The U.S. set out to buy Egypt with massive foreign aid as well as military subsidies for leaders that held pro-western views. However, it appears that in the quest for “globalization”, western interests now see a destabilized and violent Egypt as more useful to the grand plan. The Egyptian revolution in 2011 which highlighted what many call the “Arab Spring” was heavily manipulated by U.S. and European governments, but such sociopolitical engineering is still limited to the whims of the target population.

No one can create a revolution or civil war out of thin air. Years or even decades of popular angst and anger has to be fostered. The citizenry must already be near the tipping point of mass dissent. Globalists do not make revolutions occur, they simply find a revolution already brewing, and then attempt to direct the preexisting energy of the populace towards an end result that benefits the establishment the most.

Egypt is now ripe for internal conflict far beyond civil disobedience into the realm of Syrian-style civil war, and I believe our government is well aware that such a calamity is brewing...

Is The Safety Of The State Really Worth More Than The Truth?

Brandon Smith

It's a strange and terrible tragedy when a culture forgets its own history and identity. It is even more tragic when that culture becomes deluded enough to think it can replace its heritage from scratch; that it can conjure political and social reformations out of thin air, and abandon the centuries upon centuries of accomplishment and failures of generations past. To think that one can live without the lessons and principles of one's ancestors is a disease – a mental disorder of the highest caliber. It is an insanity that leads to terrifying catastrophe.

There is no such thing as “starting over” or “rising anew”. There is no such thing as pure and unadulterated “change”. All shifts in human civilization are a product of that which has come before, and therefore each of these shifts retains the ideas, accomplishments, and dreams of our forefathers. No matter how ingenious we think we are today, most grand schemes and wondrous plans for the world have already been discovered, rediscovered, and applied over and over again by industrious men, great men, and even nefarious men century after century.

Unique ideas are very rare. The American Republic, as a sociopolitical structure, is such an idea.

Get Ready For The Next Great Stock Market Exodus

Brandon Smith

In the years 2006 and 2007, the underlying stability of the global economy and the U.S. credit base in particular was experiencing intense scrutiny by alternative economic analysts. The mortgage-driven Xanadu that was the late 1990s and early 2000s seemed just too good to be true.

Many of us pointed out that such a system, based on dubious debt instruments animated by the central banking voodoo of arbitrary fractional reserve lending and fiat cash creation, could not possibly survive for very long. A crash was coming, it was coming soon, and most of our society was either too stupid to recognize the problem or too frightened to accept the reality they knew was just over the horizon.

Learn A Post-Collapse Trade Before It’s Too Late

Brandon Smith

There comes a point in the analysis of any problem when its escalation turns so blatantly obvious that the disaster is self-explanatory. The economic crisis in the United States and around the globe is one of those problems. While there are still plenty of people out there who remain ignorant to the immediate danger, I think we are very close (at least in America) to a point of maximum velocity. The more accelerated the awakening, however, the faster globalist interests will pull the plug on what remains of our financial system.

Most citizens are at least vaguely concerned with the state of our country and are attempting to learn more. The survival methodology has gone mainstream and grows in popularity daily. Even the annual Bilderberg meeting — a confab of the world’s most influential economic and political power mongers, which mainstream media entities have long refused to publicly acknowledge — is finally being exposed to the light of day. We are now in a race, a mad dash to shape the future battle space before the elites position themselves for the final conflict.

Further economic analysis would merely reaffirm what most of us in the liberty movement already know, but let’s recap our situation for the sake of clarity.

Why The Surveillance State Must Be Erased

Brandon Smith

In America today there is a great rushing storm, a swirling hurricane of clashing opinions and ideologies that defy coherent organization and classification. This social tempest has been triggered by certain revelations among the general public on issues which we in the Liberty Movement have long been aware.

The fact that our government is bought and paid for by international corporate interests, the fact that our government has positioned itself to spy on ALL Americans without warrant and without probable cause, the fact that our government is instituting policy initiatives that target common citizens as enemy combatants, the fact that every one of our Constitutional rights is being deliberately torn away; these things are not news to us, but to many once-ignorant people, they are a shock to the system. 

Open corruption on the part of a criminal establishment has a funny way of politicizing everyone, even those people who go out of their way to avoid the bigger picture. In the end, no man or woman gets a pass. Whether you like it or not, one day soon, you will have to choose a side; freedom or tyranny. There is no middle ground. There is no Switzerland.